Lost in Translation

Dear friend,

You may be one of the most passionate people I know. The last thing I want to do is try to rein in your enthusiasm. You're passionate for your God. You're passionate for people. You're passionate for communication. Your enthusiasms know no bounds. Understand I'm not judging you for who you are. I have no desire to change your personality or your passions or your preferences.

Here's where it gets difficult, at least for me. We're both Christ followers, as I understand you and I understand me. Surprisingly, in the first century, they weren't called Christians. There had been no crusades. The people actually called themselves the "People of the Way" The only people who would have called them Christians in the first few centuries were those who hated and despised them. Instead the Christ followers of The Book of Acts and beyond knew themselves simply as "People of the Way" And they certainly weren't called the "church" because the word and the people who would speak it hadn't been born yet. Church was actually bases on a 16th century German word "kirke" or kirche, depending on whether you were reading High German or Low German;. At it's best, this was simply Both words mean the same thing: "building." So, if you're following along, religious leaders in the Protestant Reformation made the foundational decision to describe Jesus' followers primarily by the term for the bricks and stones where they publicly met. OK. And then spent the next 700 years trying to remind people the church wasn't a building. Sorry, sirs and madams, but the etymology of your language suggests quite the opposite.

The first time Jesus addresses the following that was being formed, he says to Peter, "You are Peter, and upon this rock, I will build my ekklesia." The Greek word here literally (where here the word literally is used literally, and fulfills my concern for linguistic correctness) means "the called out ones." Let that sink in. Not only is God calling people out of their sins or their situations, He's calling them out of their own misconceptions and self delusions and laziness. And this same God is calling them out into community

So, since we're both Christ followers, and we're intended to be called out, here it is. You've chosen to be a "Christian communicator" Okay. Then learn to communicate. Step one. Realize you've got a lot of area for growth.

Okay, let me communicate just a few more points.

Communication is so much more than a two way street. The act of speaking and hearing and listening and receiving and embracing and acting isn't If you want to be a great communicator, the words you speak are only small fraction of what you're communicating. If you want to communicate, it's not just what you say, how those words are strung together, when it's said, how it's said, what context it's spoken into, and whether or not you've allowed space and time for response. Communication, for great communicators, is a 100-100 proposition. Great communicators want to do everything that they can to engage the fullest response from those with whom they are in dialogue. If you're going to be a great communicator, you're not just responsible for what you say, you're responsible for what is heard. And you're responsible for speaking in a way and manner and time that your communication is most likely to be received.

Consider for a moment the simple phrase you've used many times, "Jesus loves you." Do you know the person you are speaking with (not speaking to, or at, hopefully, but with-- that's a whole different conversation) to know their context for those words? Does the "you" of which you speak believe he or she or they are lovable? How does that person understand love? Did that person grow up hearing "you know I love you, right" after receiving an emotional or physical beat-down from someone who should have known better? Or was "I love you" merely a prelude for getting the pants down and giving into gravity? Take the time to ask this person with whom you speak "Tell me what you think when I say Jesus." Be prepared for an "I don't know." But instead of filling in the silence with your words, draw out hers or his or theirs. The burden of being a great communicator is recognizing that the words we throw out as flowers and bread can hit like flaming arrows or stones when the land in the ears of those we're trying to love. The responsibility of being a great communicator is recognizing "Yes. I am responsible for what lands."

Be very careful of what you think you've been "called" to say. I can only tell you for me, that often what I think is a heavenly calling is, after proper reflection, comes out of some personal compulsion or need of my own. Or a previously poor dietary choice. Or a lack of sleep. That's why I write these letters. Because so often, it has so much more to do with blessing or changing or challenging me, then it has to do with communicating with others. So here's the approach I take: if I think I need to say something, I write it down. And then I file it as a draft. Because often 24 hours later, it's not important at all, and my energies are focused elsewhere. And if I still feel that I can't NOT say it, then I'll try to find a time where I can sit down with someone I love and speak with them face to face, first about all the things on which we agree. And if we get to it, I'll ask for permission to share my heart. And to take a further step and share what's at stake if nothing changes.

Those three things seem enough for now. So I'll file this away, here, for now, where you'll probably never see it. Did you wonder why you haven't heard this yet? I'm not sure how it will land. And that's on me. If someday you read this, please realize that I'm not putting you on blast. Or maybe I'm calling us out together. Because I think we can certainly agree the world around us does not need more people who communicate themselves rather than Jesus. And maybe, if we walk and talk together, we can both figure out how to communicate in a more powerful way.

Thus spake,

me.